Brazil–Initial Thoughts

There is little here that will resemble coherent thinking, it is just a bunch of thoughts that are on my mind and I want to share about my time in Brazil.

I slept horribly on the plane ride but other than that it was the most smooth trip I ever experienced. Hats off to Delta. Getting through customs was beyond easy. Passport stamped and out we went. I kept waiting to be stopped regarding the luggage but that never happened.

First thoughts of Brazil was the humidity (not bad) so that you could “smell” the air. Second thought was how green it is. Temperature was perfect even though the man escorting us kept apologizing for how cool it was.

I had a few hours before I taught the first class so I tried to get some work done. I was so tired I found myself face down on the keyboard. I gave up and laid down to rest but tried to read my Kindle first. That lasted about 1 minute after I began slapping myself on the head with it as I fell asleep.

The people here at the seminary and church are incredibly aware of us and desire to serve us. Very different from Cameroon. I cannot eat a lot of carbs and they are happy to help and keep rejecting my offer to help pay the costs. I have decided to shut up and just be thankful.

The first day of teaching went very well. Gave the most boring part of the class right up front dealing with higher textual criticism. They were engaged with me and asked the right kind of questions. My interpreter, Alberto, is very good and I had to thank him repeatedly as he sought to make complex English thoughts clear in Portuguese.

I was able to teach on the nature of written text and the various philosophies connected to it. Some of my key points was that we need to understand that there is a meaning in the text. That meaning is the author’s. It is knowable and it is our job to find it and teach it. I emphasized that pastors are servants to the text and never the other way around. Arrogance will cause a person to seek to assert his meaning and purposes into a text.

I used a few texts just to help them understand the value of knowing genre as well. We talked about Joseph in Genesis and how the meaning of the story of Joseph is found in 50:20. Then we considered how parallelisms work in Psalms by looking at and how it is usually treated (wrongly) versus a proper approach. Then we ended with a quick survey through to show how these seemingly distinct events of healing in vss 2-16 are all illustrations of the main point in vs 17—Jesus is the Messiah prophesied of in the Old Testament. All of this designed to help them realize that there is a meaning in the text and it is their job to work until they know it.

We have a little Black and Decker coffee maker in our apartment. Stupid thing can’t pour coffee into the mug without half of it dribbling down the side onto the floor. End result is that I won’t buy one of their makers ever. Philemon is coffee-making challenged as well. But I will not tell of his problems, he can start his own blog if he desires.

We went to a supermarket here and I am determined to introduce Philemon to frying cheese tomorrow. He is already choosing to not like it, but I shall overcome.

That sums up what I have time for. I am now working on my exam and trying to get a small nap in before I go and teach.

Like this:

LikeLoading...

Related

About Matt Henry

Middle-aged pastor trying to figure out how to be missional in his world. Loves his wife, his children, and his dog Bear. I have a love of woodworking even though woodworking doesn't always love me.
The name is xagete but is pronounced exegete.